Trust, Complexity and Control

Book excerpt: An increasing reliance on the Internet and mobile communication has deprived us of our usual means of assessing another party’s trustworthiness. This is increasingly forcing us to rely on control. Yet the notion of trust and trustworthiness is essential to the continued development of a technology-enabled society. Trust, Complexity and Control offers readers a single, consistent explanation of how the sociological concept of ‘trust’ can be applied to a broad spectrum of technology-related areas; convergent communication, automated agents, digital security, semantic web, artificial intelligence, e-commerce, e-government, privacy etc. It presents a model of confidence in which trust and control are driven and limited by complexity in one explanatory framework and demonstrates how that framework can be applied to different research and application areas. Starting with the individual’s assessment of trust, the book shows the reader how application of the framework can clarify misunderstandings and offer solutions to complex problems. The uniqueness of Trust, Complexity and Control is its interdisciplinary treatment of a variety of diverse areas using a single framework. Sections featured include: Trust and distrust in the digital world. The impact of convergent communication and networks on trust. Trust, economy and commerce. Trust-enhancing technologies. Trust, Complexity and Control is an invaluable source of reference for both researchers and practitioners within the Trust community. It will also be of benefit to students and lecturers in the fields of information technology, social sciences and computer engineering.